Progression of Preliminary Task:

The preparing for the main task compared to the basic preliminary task was a lot more in depth and complicated as it required you to take more care and attention into detail of every aspect of your sequence. Regarding sound for example, in the prelim task we didn't need to pay much attention on what lighting we used for what effect and we didn't consider changing it during our filming. In our main task however, we spent a lot of time on and off set, thinking of ways in which we could possibly use lighting to create a tense and gloomy atmosphere. In the prelim we had to follow a set storyboard whereas in the main task we had to write our own storyboard with dialogue and choose our own costumes. Consequently, much more planning was needed as we had to think about what we wanted our sequence to look like and how we wanted to represent it, instead of following a set guideline.




I found storyboarding quite tedious as it took a lot of time to choose what shots best fit with the dialogue. I wanted to use certain shots that would express the contrasting characters and their different moods instead of just representing this in the dialogue, which we did in the prelim task. In the main task, we had to develop our basic prelim brief of wide-medium-close to a sophisticated sequence with a visual narrative where we used more advanced shots such as high and low angle. In our main tasks we cut between different shots during one action such as when Simon gets punched at the beginning of the sequence. This was a lot more sophisticated in contrast to our prelim task where we only cut to different shots between dialogue.

Example of match on action in Main Task
















Consequently, since our prelim tasks I have developed and improved my skills on camera by using more advanced shots. I also found the main task easier to film because I had the experience in the preliminary task where I learnt how to shoot basic shots and how to set up the camera. Since the prelim task, I have payed more attention on what shots I would use to express the characters in the way I intend to present them and make sure I presented a attractive visual narrative, which will appeal to my target audience. In the main task I used close ups of the Russian men and Simon to show their different emotions. Furthermore, this presented the Russians in a more evil and aggressive way in comparison to Simon, which is how I wanted to present them to my audience in my planning.
















The more advanced shots I used in the Main Task demonstrated my developed skills since the prelim. An example of this is a high angle shot of Simon getting punched:








In the Basic Preliminary Task, no sound effects were added when using Final Cut Pro so dialogue and ambient sound was only used. In my Main Task however, my use of sound had developed as sound effects of punches, water and a heart beat were added as well as backing music in the opening sequence. By the Main Task, I payed a lot more attention to details, such as sound in comparison to the prelim task, which recquired a lot more work in editing.




I found my ability to master new technology when using Final Cut Pro quite good as I found it very interesting. Therefore, I improved my skills in cutting between shots and learnt a lot of new ones, such as adding/editing sound. Looking back at the Preliminary Task, I can see that cuts between shots are jumpy and unpleasant to watch as an audience. In my Main Task however, I improved on cutting between shots by spending more time in editing and using 'cross fade'. Consequently, the cuts between shots are a lot smoother and more natural to watch.

Audience Feedback

We first asked, "What do you think the basic plot of this thriller is?" and our response was:

• A story about Russian bad men, who caught a man as he knew something they needed
• Man being tortured for information
• A Man who was being tortured for information and then they brought in his wife
• Terroists interrogating a man and getting his wife involved in the struggle
• A hostage
• Spy being tortured
• Man being held hostage by Russians, they bring in his lover so eventually he will have to talk in order for them not to hurt her
• Torturing because they want a code

We then asked, "What do you think are the key strengths of this thriller and why?"

• Very convincing, good editing and actors
• Props and setting were very convincing
• good use of sound
• the atmosphere and speaking russian
• blood in the water
• good acting
• editing very good
• good music that creates suspense and good effect with the accents
• water shot of Simon
• different types of camera angles
• effective lighting - water relecting on the wall, make-up done well
• punching realistic

Finally we asked, "How do you think this thriller could be made even more effective and why?"

• Sound effects
• poor lighting - difficult to see
• include more torture shots
• acting wasn't good
• swearing is bad
• need more convincing ending
• title could have been more effective
• cleaner cuts
• made the girl looked more roughed up

To conclude, I am quite pleased with the Main Task, however, there are a few things I would amend if possible.  In my view, I think more care should have been taken over the storyboard as on the shooting day, a lot of things were changed, which, as a result made the beginning of our sequence quite abrupt as it starts immediately with Simon being punched.  Furthermore, you don't get a sense of the set or the characters until half way through the sequence, which is quite confusing for the audience.  The feedback supported this by saying that the ending could have been improved however, it seemed that most people understand the storyline quite well according to the answers in our first question.  In addition, something I didn't consider that was pointed out in the same question was the girl as many people believed it was Simon's wife and not her daughter.  Therefore, if I were to redo this task, I would use a younger girl to amend this or change the storyline and use an older woman and have them bring his wife in (similar to the Spooks episode we studied).  In my view, I believe a key weakness, which wasn't pointed out in the third answers was the dialogue, which was quite boring at some points, such as when the Russian repeats 'still being a tough guy' in between the water-dunking scene. However, in the the third answers, it is pointed out that the swearing wasn't good, which I do agree with to an extent as swearing in some points was appopriate but there was a bit too much of it.  I think that the main strengths of our project was our set, the use of  lighting, the Russian dialogue and some camera work, which seemed to be the most popular in the feedback also.  I think the reflection of the water on the walls in the background worked very well in the mood we were trying to present.  Furthermore, after editing, I believe that the water-dunking scene was very successful on screen and was our best shot in our sequence.

Using technologies in our thriller

How did we attract our target audience:

How Did We Attract Our Target Audience

Target Audience:

I believe that our target audience for our film would be ages 15-25 because it contains suspense and action, which most suits this age range.  The audience would be attracted to the 'action' in our thriller also, mainly males because through research,  this is the most popular type of genre for them.  People aged 15-25 would normally go to the cinema on the weekends or be out with their friends.  However, in the day, our target audience would be studying, which means that our Thriller would be best released during a holiday, preferably in winter because the cinema would be even more popular then.  Our secondary audience would be 25-35years.  They might like this film because it is based on the Chechnya War, which they can relate to more than our younger target audience.  Our genre of film would be more likely to attract a more male audience as it involves violence and action but it's not so brutal that a female audience wouldn't be interested because its emotional also (when the spy's daughter is brought in).  Therefore, our film is aimed at both a male and female audience.  For example, the film 'Taken', which inspired our idea of our thriller was an action thriller and contained violence but it was still very popular towards a female audience because it had the emotional attachment of the man's daughter being hurt and taken from him - similar to our thriller.  







Example of a member of our Target Audience

Name:  Merlin

Age:  17

Interests:  Boxing, cars and playing Xbox

Favourite Movie:  Taken

Favourite game on Xbox:  Call of Duty – Modern Warfare

Universal Studios:

The institution that would make our film would be Universal Pictures. I think that Universal would choose to make our film, because it’s a mainstream type of movie, and that’s what big production companies like Universal like, they care about the profit of the film not the quality in a sense. Universal has made the Jason Bourne trilogy and the Fast and Furious series, all of which are action packed blockbusters, and this is what our thriller is all about. Universal would make this a medium budget film so from about $70 million and they would hire a director with a good amount of experience. They would market it through posters and you tube, there would also be advertisements on TV and on the sides on buses. They would most likely get an A list Hollywood movie star, who would attract a larger audience of people as they are already well known by the public, and accomplished successful actors. They would also make money from the film through DVD sales, and pay per view. They don’t really specialize in any genre; all of their films are mainstream movies so they are quite open to any film that will get them their profits. They don’t have a specific target audience as they do such a variety of films that the majority of the public will enjoy so from both genders to the ages of 15 and above.

Having researched this Gareth Edwards worked for Virtigo films before moving onto Warner Bros, he demonstrated at Virtigo that he could make an excellent film on a low budget, and then Warner Bros have given him a big budget high concept film, The Clash of the Titans 2. So having reevaluted, i have decided to go with Virtigo films.

Virtigo films make very low budget films, that are usually aimed at a target audience between the ages of 15-30 years. They usually produce films that involve social problems within Britian, for example The Football Factory, that is full of football, and violence, which appears to a young audience. Most of their films are budgeted at £500k, with little SFX and infamous actors. The reason why they would choose me is because I am a First Time Director, with no experience, and Virtigo allow first time directos to make a low budget film, Virtigo also use very cheap Viral Marketing to spread the word around about a film. They also own their own distributing comapny, so I could be confident that my film would reach the cinema even if it was only for a few days, but I would be looking at the profits at the DVD section, where Vertigo usually make most of their profits. Because the films that Virtigo produce usually appeal to a niche audience.

Representation of Particular Social Groups:

How does your product represent particular social groups?

We wanted to represent an idea of a Russian Mafia in our film, which are agressive and cruel.  Therefore, they conformed to dominant ideologies and were the stereotypical Russian type.  This was an idea similar to one represented in an episode of Spooks that we studied where binary opposites between the evil Eastern Russians and the Heroic Westerns were established.  This conformed to dominant ideologies of the Russians being corrupt and was a typical drama plot, which we put in our Thriller.  The agents represented in this Thriller were similar to how we represent the agent in our Thriller:  caring/considerate, has a family and feels responsible for their country:

Agents in Spooks

Fiona was very loyal, both to her family and colleagues but she struggled with the conflict of espionage and motherhood.  She loved her son Wes but would never leave the MI5 willingly.

Fiona's husband, Adam was a hard worker but always dreamt of sharing a stable home life with his wife and son.  However, Fiona was shot while trying to avenge her previous life in Syria.  Consequently, Adam went into denial at first but eventually realised that focussing on his work was the best way for him to handle his loss.

Danny was a young and sharp agent who lost his life for his country (in the Spooks episode that we studied).













In contrast, the idea of the Russians being opposite to the agent in characteristics is similar to how Russians are represented in the film Eastern Promises:


Images in the News in Russia in particular, represent how this idea of masculinity is represented for the stereotypical Russian in the media.  An example of this is an image of Putin hunting with his top off, presenting the 'Alpha male' type: 'The Telegraph'

In contrast, our agent in our Thriller is represented to have more feelings and is more caring, such as when he starts screaming in horror once his daugher gets brought in.  Consequently, this represents English men in a much better light compared to Russian men.  You could relate Simon in the Thriller to characters in films such as James Bond where the English man is presented as the 'Hero' and the more appealing person to the audience in comparison to foreign men, such as Russians:

The dunking scene in the opening sequence of James Bond relates to the slow motion clip of Simon being dunked into the tank in our Thriller

However the difference between James Bond and Simon is that Bond always escapes or seems to be in control of the bad situation he's in.  In our thriller, it is very unsure to the audience whether Simon will actually survive or not.  Furthermore, this is why it gives a exciting feel as unlike James Bond where the audience know he will always survive, the audience have the anticipation of what will happen next.  

Editing Task:

We started the first day of editing by all sitting and looking through all of our shots that we had done. We set them all in the right order to get ourselves more organised and easier to when we were going to have to cut our takes. We also marked the takes as good, average and bad, we did this to see which takes were the best and which ones we were going to use in our thriller.

We chose shots with the best visual takes, and the takes which were performed best by the actors; we wanted these to show that our thriller was going to look like a real opening sequence to a Hollywood thriller. The reason to why we picked the takes with the clearest visual affects and the best acting performances was because we wanted the audience to really feel as if they were there in the room with them. We wanted them to feel a cold and off the edge of their chair sensation, we wanted the audience to be fearful of the three Chechnyan terrorists.

We used continuity editing, to bring suspense and tension for the audience, for example by zooming in on the spies face to an eye line match of one of the guns that the terrorist was holding in his hand, showing that he was in power with this dangerous weapon. We also used shot reverse shot with the spy and the head terrorist, with this we could have a high angle shot from the perspective of the terrorist looking at the spy to show that he was more dominant and more in power during this situation of time. With all this we wanted to create the tension and suspense, making the audience feel nervous and concerned for the spies life.

Our thriller was quite slow paced throughout most of the time, because most of it was the terrorists torturing or shouting at the spy, but we did speed up the pace towards the end of the thriller, when the terrorist puts a gun to the spies’ daughters head. We sped up the pace of the editing, with the intension of making the audience feel more on the edge and frightened of what the terrorists were going to do the child.

We wanted to create the perspective that the terrorists were the villains in our thriller because they were torturing the innocent spy. We also wanted the terrorists to appear stronger than the spy, and we showed this by camera work and by them torturing the spy. We used binary opposition for the spy who was weaker in this situation but was still the hero, because he serves his country and tries to save peoples lives. We did this because we wanted to make to broaden the amount of people who would want to see our thriller; it was a mainstream thriller.

We used sound affects, to create a bigger impact of the mood we wanted to set for the audience. For example we used sound affects for when the terrorists were punching the spy or drowning him in water. We also used a sound affect to make the door sound squeaky, just to give that emphasis of a cold feel on the audience. We also used a sound of a generator in the background just to add the affect that it was an abandoned warehouse.

I found final cut pro a bit of a challenge to start with, but when I got the hang of it was rather easy. For example when doing the sound it was too complicated, we just had to listen to the sound that was more clear, and chose that to put in the thriller. The whole process of taking a small scene of one take was difficult to start with, but it was quite easy once you got the hand of it.

There are a few things that I would want to change and re shoot in the thriller, for example I would want to re shoot all the scenes where the terrorist is punching the spy. The reason for this is, is that the punches don’t seem very realistic, and it just makes the thriller seem more of an amateur film, when we want it to look more professional.

I did enjoy my experience with editing, it was a long and complicated process, but I did enjoy it. I especially liked the parts of editing where we had to choose the best takes that we did for the scene. I found it rather interesting how the takes could be so different even though the camera was still in the same place and all the props were the same, it was just sometimes it was more clear on camera on some takes, and others as not as clear.

I enjoyed working as a team; it really helped with the editing, by getting different personal opinions and seeing a different perspective of the thriller. We all did different roles when we edited, we rotated to do different things, so that we all got an experience of the whole process of editing, and we also felt that it would be more efficient this way, to speed up the editing process.

I feel that I’ve learnt a lot about filmmaking from this experience, and I am now appreciative of the people who are behind the scenes in a high concept films, because all the directing, editing, sound and lighting takes a lot of work and effort to set up. We filmed all day for only a two minute sequence, and that is why I now appreciate the people who are behind the camera in a movie, I feel that I now understand how hard and tough the process is of bringing a film to together.